


Before the Storm

by MechanicusBob



Category: Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening Spoilers, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-10-01 00:06:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17233691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MechanicusBob/pseuds/MechanicusBob
Summary: Context: Based on a writing prompt in the Dragon Age Subreddit from a while ago, about an AU where the Qunari have launched their invasion of the rest of Thedas.





	Before the Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Context: Based on a writing prompt in the Dragon Age Subreddit from a while ago, about an AU where the Qunari have launched their invasion of the rest of Thedas.

For twelve long months, their efforts had edged further into southern lands and paranoia danced in the cities and tribes of Thedas as neighbours grew to fear one another. No longer were the Qunari simple grey giants with horns like Oxen, they were Humans, Elves and Dwarves; they were old friends and loved ones. The frontiers may have been holding, but the civilian pillars they rested upon across Thedas were slowly cracking and eroding under the paranoia caused by the war. The Arishok knew all too well the danger that Bas could pose if they were determined enough and sowing the seeds of discord among civilians had been made a priority.  
  
One Bas in particular had been marked as a target from the outset of the war. The so called ‘Hero of Ferelden’; a Mage whom the Arishok had once come to regard as a mighty ally and as close to a friend as one could regard a beast. To sentence him to his fate had pained the Arishok deeply, knowing how the creature treasured its freedom; but sacrifices were expected to be made by all, if the Bas were to be brought under the Qun. He would not allow any exceptions. He _could_ not allow himself to do so.  
  
Watching the Grey Warden struggle with all of its might, only to be nullified by his chains and his collar, had stirred something more than pity within the Arishok that he could not quite place. However, a hound as dutiful as Tormen deserved his attention during the process; it was only right that the creature receive due respect as it was inducted into its rightful place. The Grey Warden’s cries of pain and then their muffled defiance as his lips were sealed had returned to the Arishok the same night. Causing him to linger in wakefulness and once more feel the sinking feeling of a kennel master having to put down a faithful dog after many years of service. It was for the Grey Warden’s own good, they would realise that in due time.  
  
Breaking the new Saarebas however had proven to be an exercise in futility; even after its lips and left eye were stitched shut, and shackles were placed upon it. So stubborn had the Grey Warden been that the Arishok had been forced to assign two Arveraad to its unit. One to oversee the other Saarebas, and one to oversee the Blood Mage tasked with controlling the Grey Warden.

* * *

 Amidst a howling storm, vast ships beached themselves upon the coast of Ferelden, beneath the dark cliffs east of Amaranthine, and the onslaught of Qunari were greeted by yet another storm. One of arrows, boulders, steel, and fire.

Grey Wardens lined the cliffs and allies waited beneath the shore. They sensed the Commander in the depths of a carrier. They bayed for Qunari blood.  
  
The Ben-Hassrath should have hamstrung the Bas’ bulkhead as soon as ships appeared on the horizon. Where were they?

The Karasten growled from the helm of their ship as the bombardment continued and the intended storming of the coast descended into a massacre. Atop the cliff, a beacon was lit and from behind the redoubt flew volley after volley of boulders that peppered the beach, crushed Antaam and broke holes in the prows of the carriers

Movement below caught his eye. A counter-charge had been launched; lifting his spirits before dashing them an instant later. The charging force were not Bas, they were Ben-Hassrath; the Ben-Hassrath the Arishok had hand-picked to infiltrate the Grey Wardens. The ones who had delivered the new Saarebas to them. Atop the earthen walls of the Bas’ redoubt, a figure stood, guiding the Ben-Hassrath and bending them to his will. The Karasten seethed as the former spies were cut down at the whim of a blood mage.

More presences earned his attention as Qunari butchered their former allies in their grinding advance towards the cliffs.  
  
"Slaughter them. Slaughter them all." The Architect’s rasping words echoed in the minds of the Disciples.  
Sand and stones trembled beneath their feet as the few beasts more foul than Mages clawed their way to the surface, whilst others dragged Qunari down into the darkness below. Among the Grey Wardens stood a sight wholly disgusting to the Karasten. A gaunt figure whose skin was taut and merged with large black stones; no doubt another mage formerly in the service of the newest Saarebas.  
Disciple and Warden Scouts swarmed from beneath the Qunari, bogging them down in a quagmire of blades whilst their brethren above loosed yet more piercing arrows and blazing spells. The beach was slick with blood and peals of thunder preceded brilliant flashes of lightning as the final wave were unleashed.

The final formations of Antaam surged forth from their hold, eager to bolster their wavering kin and escape the bombardment of stones and spells their ships were suffering. They had almost reached the pass and once atop the cliffs, they were certain the tide would turn. If only they could reach the top now that the Bas’ Mages were surely tiring and their archers ammunition had to be dwindling. How sorely they had underestimated both the endurance and resources of their foes.  
  
Across the beach, Qunari remains of all races lay scattered and dismembered among a sea of Darkspawn, Grey Wardens, arrows and boulders. The Karasten growled once more as the final wave charged headlong into the storms awaiting them and a new wave of fury swept over the defenders. Finally, Grey Warden and Darkspawn alike sensed Tormen upon the field. He was among the final slaves condemned to support the waning advance.  
  
At long last, the signal was given. Packs of Mabari and a torrent of steel were unleashed towards the beach. The winds and rain continued to buffet the battlefield as archers and mages; Warden and Hurlock alike, maintained their now weary bombardment and the Scouts struggled to push their advantage of surprise any further.  
  
The river of steel clashed with the tide of muscle and the Grey Wardens weathered the fanatical advance as the Mabari fanned out and tore savagely at their prey. Disregarding their losses as the Qunari cleaved through their armour the Wardens and Disciples fought on to grant a window to their few former, and single active, Templars to break away and quarantine the Saarebas whilst the remaining Scouts swamped their foe from behind. A well placed salvo of magic streaked through the howling gale and felled the pair of Arveraad; granting the final window to dispose of the Saarebas in their confusion. The Blood Mage flailed in terror but was torn asunder before it could send its vile puppet to its doom in its stead. As the Mage choked on its own blood, the final Saarebas, the only human among the troupe of Qunari and Elves fell trembling to the sand.  
  
Tormen’s senses returned to him in a flood as the spell was broken. He was freezing, starving, aching and exhausted; fear clutched his heart as he realised he could not speak, nor could he see through his left eye. Muffled terror escaped him as he surveyed the sea of corpses and scorch marks across the beach and fumbled in vain against both his mask and collar. Kara fell to her knees and threw her arms around Tormen as he thrashed and scrambled in vain at his bindings; she had never seen such unbridled fear in him. The look in his eyes after Uldred’s revolt paled in all comparisons to this moment. When he finally fell still, Kara removed his mask for him and simply held him in her arms  
  
His gut sank and her heart broke as she saw his face. He was beaten bloody and his lips and left eye had been sewn together as tightly as possible with wide leather stitches. Tormen watched through his remaining eye and Kara couldn’t help but weep for him, tightening her grip around his torso; her tears gathering on his shoulder. Harker bound to his master’s side and nuzzled against him intensely. Wishing with all his heart to take away his pain.  
  
Hrak loomed over the trio as the remaining forces descended from the Cliff Side and sent the final Qunari to their deaths, ignoring the bombarding winds and arcing lightning bolts above. As the Wardens and Disciples gathered around their friend and Commander, Hrak wrenched the collar around Tormen’s neck apart and then knelt to slowly cut his stitches. The Human’s mouth was freed but even Hrak knew that his eye had been all but destroyed.  
  
"Parshaara!" The Karasten bellowed through the storm and Tormen froze. "You were shown the true path of your kind and yet you are too blind to know what’s good for you! Void take you, Saarebas."

Slowly Tormen stood, leaning on his staff for support, heaving for breath and lumbered towards the Karasten in defiance of the creature’s vast blade and towering posture. The pouring rain turned colder and colder until hailstones bombarded the shore and Tormen swept the onslaught around himself and the beast before him.

"I’m. Not. Qunari!"

The thunder intensified as Tormen’s voice boomed and lightning arced across his beaten form. Peal after peal of rumbled in the sky, each one growing closer and closer than the last. The lightning that had previously arced between clouds now raged and struck the earth like the wrath of the Maker himself. Ignoring the blood dripping from his stitches, and the force of the howling ice storm he had trapped himself and the Karasten within; a crackling beam was loosed from Tormen’s staff.

“Saarebas!”

The lightning grew excruciating as the Karasten spoke.

“My name…” Tormen panted, “Is Tormen Amell! Say it!”

“Saare-” Once more the pain grew and the Karasten writhed. Why wasn’t the beast ending him?

“Say my name!”

“Saa-” Again and again, the bolts grew more powerful, holding the Karasten in unbearable agony as every muscle in his body spammed and tried to tear itself from his bones.

“Say. My. _FUCKING NAME!”_ Tormen roared through both the storm that hammered the shore, and the frigid hellscape of his own making. Despite his training, despite his faith and despite all he had endured in life, the Karasten could bear the pain no longer; finally yielding to the beast’s demands.

“Tor-… Tormen… A… Amell!” his words battled through the blinding pain of the unyielding lightning and searing ice but earned him no release. A final surge coursed through Tormen, amplified a hundred fold by his pain, and soon the Karasten was no more. The hailstorm slowly dispersed into the aether and all that remained of the beast who thought itself his master was a pile of ash and a pair of charred horns. Returning his attention to Kara, his fellow Wardens and the Disciples, Tormen maintained his composure long enough to see to the retrieval of fallen allies and their return to Vigil’s Keep. When at long last he was alone in his chambers, in Kara’s arms, Tormen broke. Finally allowing an ocean of pain and fear to overwhelm him, and there they stayed until his tears ran dry, his voice turned hoarse, and a safe and dreamless sleep enveloped him for the first time in far too long.

* * *

 

Hrak saw to it that the bodies of the Qunari were mounted along the coast of Amaranthine as a warning against future attempts to storm the cliffs of Ferelden; a message that Amaranthine would not fall to the Qun.

Several weeks after the failed landing, a parcel marked for the Arishok reached Par Vollen and several were almost sick as the Arishok unveiled its contents: the Karasten’s charred horns, engraved with two words in Common Tongue ‘Tormen Amell’. The Parcel also contained a missive that read ‘run’.

Far to the south, the stranded Qunari ships had been dragged ashore to be studied and the Warden Commander looked north from atop Vigil’s keep as lightning struck the ground below. His eye had been beyond saving and the scars in his lips were still healing but already, plans were forming in his mind for the eventual counter-attack. Plans of how he would make Sten, his title be damned, pay for all that he had done and the lives he had cost. Be they Warden, Disciple or Civilian.


End file.
